General Discontent

For years now I have been watching as a seemingly endless parade of retired military officers appear on the cable news channels to explain why our military is so great, how we are doing such an excellent job in Afghanistan and Iraq, and how when our weapons work, you know the lines, surgical bombing, collateral damage, extraordinary rendition, all the usual military euphemisms. So it was refreshing to see General John Batiste appear in a TV commercial recently sponsored by a group called VoteVets.org, in which he scolds President Bush for his poor management of the War in Iraq. “Mr. President, you did not listen,” remarks the General.
“There was never enough. There was never a reserve,” he said. “Again and again, we had to move troops by as many as 200 miles out of our area of operations to support another sector. We would pull troops out of contact with the enemy and move them into contact with the enemy somewhere else. The minute we’d leave, the insurgents would pick up on that, and kill everybody who had been friendly.”

Wow!

Ouch!!

Now I am no fan of this war and occupation, but I do understand the need for a military, and I believe if you are going to do anything, do it right. It was bad enough to watch this nation led into war on bogus terms, and to discover that there were no weapons of mass destruction, but to have Generals who served in Iraq resigning from the military in protest for the way the “Commander in Chief” has been conducting the war, which is what General batiste has done, makes me wonder what is it going to take for some people to admit that President George W. Bush is an utter and complete failure.

Close your eyes, clinch your fists, and repeat, “stay the course, stay the course,
stay the course…”

Not to worry, there is a new plan, the “surge” will solve our problems.

This story gets better, because after the commercial with General Batiste aired, he was asked by CBS news, who employed him as a consultant, to step down from his position at CBS news. Linda Mason, a vice president at CBS news made a statement in which she said that when military officials are hired by CBS, they are expected to share their expertise with the CBS viewers, and that by appearing in an anti-Bush ad, viewers would get the feeling that everything he says would be anti-Bush. The General agreed to step down.

I don’t watch CBS news, but I do wonder if CBS news would ask a General that appeared in a commercial praising the ability of “Commander in Chief” George W. Bush to step down.

Oh well, this may be difficult for me to understand, but it is probably more difficult for the Republican Party, because General Batiste and VoteVets.org are campaigning in the districts of Republican Congressmen in hopes of getting them defeated.

Times must be tough for Republicans when even the military is opposed to their policies.






CBS Asks Batiste to step down
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2007/05/11/publiceye/entry2791091.shtml

General Batiste speaks out
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/13/us/13generals.html?th&emc=th

Batiste fired
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/horsesmouth/2007/05/cbs.php